Okie Dokie

Our trim guy (who is about 18) is hilarious. I am pretty sure that the vast majority of his knowledge of the English language is "okie dokie"- hence the title. But, hey, we're not complaining; he does good work and FAST. He put up base boards, window trim, double crown moulding, and built-ins in six closets in 4 days.

Here is our very own fireplace (in Texas, I know...). It even comes with a remote! One very big TV will go above it. Apparetly we want the neighbors to be able to watch with us.

Here, if you look past the drawers, you can see the window seat that Luis also did within those 4 days. Monte's new favorite spot, no doubt.

And, of course, interior doors. This is the door to enter (or from this angle- depart) the master suite.

A very exciting Sunday afternoon

The plan for Sunday -as always- was work half a day and then go for a boat ride. This particular day did not go quite as planned. We completed our random tasks for the morning, leaving the culvert for last. Not a good idea. Let's just say by the end of the task -from hands on experience- we were quite sure that pouing down rain water would run through the existing culvert, into the new pieces and right out the other side.

Porch

This past weekend we poured a slab on the second floor porch. It really was quite an operation. Having no exterior staircase posed an interesting predicament. The choices were: a. spend $600 on a pump for 2 yards of concrete (I don't think so) b. fill buckets with concrete, take all the buckets -by hand- up the interior staircase, through the living room and out to the porch (really not a good nor appealing idea...those things are heavy) c. design and create some kind of pulley system (Ian mentioned a golf cart in this plan, so needless to say, that was quickly vetoed) or d. fill the buckets with concrete, find a friend with a tractor, fill the bucket of the tractor with the buckets of concrete, raise the bucket of the tractor up to the porch, have 2 or 3 guys up there to pour out the buckets, throw them back down, and repeat...did I mention we calculated it would take about 100 buckets and we only had an hour to do it? Well, we went with d. and it was a riot! I wish we had some pictures of this, but as you can imagine, I was busy.

Here is just one more shot of the Tangerine Dream. We can't wait till the rest of the exterior comes together. That should happen later this week. We'll see.

Drywall

We started drywall last week. This is the kitchen. You can see the front door there toward the left of the picture.

If you were to follow the kitchen wall (the one without windows) you will arrive at the next picture which shows the dining room windows and wall, and the stair case to the third floor.

Here is a quick shot of the master bedroom -complete with double tray ceiling.

That is all for now. We can't show you everything or no one will ever come to visit us!

Insulation

While staying warm was a big problem in Reading, staying cool might be even more of a problem here in Texas...we must insulate well. We put bats in the ceiling and went with blown in insulation in the walls.

Here is a picture of what it looked like inside when they were blowing the insulation in the walls. It is some wild stuff. They blow it in the walls, then shave it down so that it's flush, then vacuum up the excess and re-use it!

The job that NEVER ends...

I realize that the blog has been neglected for a while, but we are going to try to get you all updated for the most part. We did finally finish the elecetrical rough in, but only last night. It seems to be always something...

Here is the breaker box in the garage. This -of course- has all the fun electrical items like welding machines and such...

This box is in the back of the pantry with the REALLY imporant stuff like the washer and dryer, the fridge, all the light fixtures, the AC and most importantly... the

We do have priorities.